Europe’s Best And Worst Airports For Summer Travel, As Per June Report

European travel this summer was always going to be tricky, with a pent up demand, the high costs of tickets, the highest number of flights in the skies since 2019 and the threat of an air traffic controllers strike. That news just got a little worse if you’re traveling through London Gatwick over the next two months—named this week as the airport with the most delays and cancellations in June 2023.

Expected Busiest Places In Europe To Fly This Summer

Everyone is flying again. Britons are expected to make 25 million overseas trips by air from now until September, as reported in the U.K.’s The Times. A vast majority are heading to Europe.

Likewise, travel booking website Hopper reported that travel from U.S. to Europe is up 20% on 2019 figures and prices are the highest in five years—an average of $1,200 per ticket. European hotels are also 37% more expensive than last year, with an average night costing $205.

EuroControl, the body that governs military and commercial flights across European skies is expecting to manage up to 37,500 flights on peak days and to deal with over 96,000 messages from pilots on a daily basis. Things are also a little more strained than usual because 20% of Europe’s skies are out of bounds because of the war in Ukraine.

EuroControl has particularly singled out Reims and Marseille in France, as well as Athens and Budapest as being places where it is expecting what it calls an “overload” of planes, where there may be delays or even rerouting to avoid busy areas at busy times.

EuroControl also issued warnings for London, Barcelona, Brussels, Budapest, Nicosia, Warsaw and Zagreb, particularly on Fridays and summer weekends.

Willie Walsh, head of the International Air Transport Association said that flight disruptions in June were well beyond what was expected at that time of year.

The Best And Worst Airports, Reported By AirHelp

Passenger rights-company, AirHelp, analyzed European airports that had more than 5,000 flights in June to take a look at the delays of more than 15 minutes and any cancelations.

The worst was London Gatwick (LGW) with 54% of its flights disrupted (according to these data points). The nine other airports that fared badly were Lisbon Humberto Delgado (LIS), Copenhagen Kastrup (CPH), Paris Charles de Gaulle (CDG), Antalya (AYT), Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen (SAW), Rome Fiumicino (FCO), Manchester (MAN), Milano Malpensa (MXP) and Frankfurt (FRA). Manchester, Milano and Frankfurt all suffered delayed flights at around 43%.

Passengers looking for a smoother ride could try Vaanta airport in Helsinki, Finland, where just 18% of its flights were disrupted, using the same data points. Other airports that fared well in the review were Dusseldorf (DUS), Oslo Gardermoen Airport (OSL) and Warsaw Chopin (WAW) with around just 23% of flights delayed in June. Beyond that, Vienna (VIE), Madrid-Barajas (MAD), Barcelona-El Prat (BCN), Stockholm Arlanda (ARN) and Istanbul Havalimani (IST) came out well. Berlin’s Brandenburg airport (BER) rounded out the top ten best airports in June for delays with 34% of flights disrupted.

Regardless of where you’re traveling this summer, there’s one simple rule that you can follow to avoid delays—by being on time yourself. EuroControl will tell you that every one minute in a departure delay on the first flight in the morning will cost four minutes by the end of the day.

That can add up to a lot of time by the end of the day and it’s the one reason that anyone looking to minimize delays further could always do worse than traveling out on the first flight in the morning.